(New York) Climate justice activists from Rising Tide North America and Climate SOS in New York took to the streets on the final day of the UN Climate summit, making housecalls to the New York offices of the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), and the Nature Conservancy. NRDC’s street-level banner was festooned with a 14 foot mock “Climate Bill” in the form of $2 trillion bank note (the approximate value of a U.S. carbon market). Imagery on the giant spoof bill critiques roles of many large environmental groups in their push for passage of the American Clean Energy and Security Act (ACESA), chiefly for its advocacy of an carbon market. Following NRDC, the offices of EDF and The Nature Conservancy received delivery visits where activists desperately tried to present organizational representatives with their version of the “green”.

These organizations are leading members of the US Climate Action Partnership (USCAP), which has united them with highly polluting corporations such as Dow, DuPont, General Electric and Alcoa Aluminum under the auspices of lobbying Congress to reduce emissions. This unsavory alliance played a major role in crafting the Waxman-Markey ACESA bill (HR 2454) passed by the US House of Representatives in July, and expected to make its way for a Senate vote imminently.

Hundreds of environmental groups OPPOSE the current US climate bill. They recognize the bill’s cap and trade provisions as a dangerous false solution, that is inherently unstable and that has historically proven incapable of reducing carbon dioxide emissions.

This event is the culmination of a three week, seven city tour, sponsored by Climate SOS, an informal alliance of scientists, activists, and local and regional environmental groups that are opposed to the current climate bill, having observed the failure of “market mechanisms” used to date to ameliorate the climate crisis.

The activists argue that the House ACESA bill “just doesn’t add up,” pointing out that it falls far short of scientifically valid targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions; removes the EPA’s authority to regulate emissions under the Clean Air Act; and incorporates massive corporate giveaways into its cap-and-trade program. If such a bill were to pass, polluting corporations would be able to defer urgently needed emissions reductions for decades under the bill’s offset provisions. International groups widely condemn the lack of US leadership on climate issues and demand that wealthy countries pay their share of the accumulated “climate debt.”